clipped from www.nytimes.com

Dick Martin, a veteran nightclub comic who with his partner, Dan Rowan, turned a midseason replacement slot at NBC in 1968 into a hit that redefined what could be done on television, died Saturday in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 86 and lived in Malibu, Calif.

The cause was respiratory failure, a family spokesman, Barry Greenberg, said. Mr. Martin had lost one lung to tuberculosis as a teenager, and in recent years he had used an oxygen tank for much of the day.

“Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,” the hyperactive, joke-packed show that Mr. Martin and Mr. Rowan rode to fame, made conventional television variety programs seem instantly passé and the sitcom brand of humor seem too meek for the times.

“My life has been divided into three parts in the show-business world: nightclubs, television, and then I was a director for 30 years of television shows,” he said in a 2006 interview on “The O’Reilly Factor.” “And I think the most fun I ever had was nightclubs. I loved nightclubs.”